A Final Note for 2007!

I thought I should throw in a final post for the year, since December has REALLY sucked for blogging!

Wishing you all a very safe, happy and prosperous new year.

See you next year!
Mari

I know! I KNOW!

I suck!!

But its 1130pm and I'm going to bed.

Theres new photos up on Flickr.

Mum, don't hassle me!

I'll get to it!

Bloody blog..

;-)

Elton Bloody Awsome John!

Its past midnight.. we just got back from Elton John..

It was A W E S O M E !!!

I had scored some free tickets to a corporate sponsored Elton Concert in a suite at Acer Arena. It was A W E S O M E!!!

They even gave us an Elton CD as we left, and also fed us before the show. 2.5 HOURS!

A W E S O M E !!!

Now I go to sleep..

When it rains it pours..

This blog post starts off on a funny note.

On Thursday night at my aqua aerobics class, the teacher had forgotten
to charge her ipod and so we were facing an hour of aqua with no music!
It was a horrific, horrific prospect, so when she asked if anyone in the
class (who were currently in the water) had an ipod on them, I had to
let it be known that I did, albeit in the car.

So off Becka went to fetch the ipod (all us grown ups were cold and
wet.. And well.. Lazy). I was a bit nervous about it.. Its amazing how
laid bare you feel when exposing your private music to strangers. After
making sure no one said diddly about my choice of music, she put my ipod
on shuffle and away we went.. To the strains of.. War of the Worlds..
Phantom of the Opera.. Olivia Newton John.. Dean Martin.. And mostly
Russian music. It was an interesting experience ;-)

Saturday is where this story starts to decline..

We went to a birthday party for the 1yr old daughter of a friend of
Tony's. It was at Homebush at Bicentennial Park. The party started out
ok, but then Josie ran down a hill, fell, skinned her knee good and
proper and howled for the next 30 mins. Poor thing was very clingy for
the rest of the party, till the pinata came out and she gave it several
good whacks and managed to break the thing.

Around the end of the party we found out that a number (5-6) cars had
been broken into in the car park where our car was. When Tony went down
to have a look he found that our car, while the window had not been
broken, had been broken into through the drivers side lock. They broke
apart the glove compartment, pulled out the stereo, went in the back,
moved the child seat aside, climbed into the boot and took Tony's
backpack.. Which had his laptop in it. Oh joy. The rest of the day was a
bit of a nightmare. We sat around waiting for the police for about 2
hours and when they didn't come we gave up and went home. After speaking
to the NRMA we found that they wouldn't cover the laptop and we're not
sure about the stereo, their claims dept needs to call me back. Gio was
less helpful, telling me that while I do have Personal Effects cover on
my home and contents, because we didn't specify the laptop, its not
covered with them either. What the HELL do we pay insurance for!?

So. What fun. Like we don't have enough to worry about.

Sunday was a bit better, with a nice brunch at Coogee with my Baba, Vika
and Becka. After brunch I dropped off Josie at Granny's so that she
could take her to Jacqui's dance recital that we all missed last night
while waiting for the Police. She enjoyed that immensely.

After that we met at the school to check out the P-6 Artwork Exhibition
that was on. Apparently every child in the infants and primary had
something up. It was gorgeous.

And that was the end of our weekend.

Its A Bad Idea...

.. to, when making an omlette in a little frying pan, on a gas stove, to spray spray-on olive oil on the previously mentioned little pan..

Long Awaited Canberra Update And More

I know.. I know.. I just couldn't get myself into the whole blogging thing lately..

Ok so weekend before last we went to Canberra. We left on Saturday morning (after stops and starts) and had a nice drive down. Josie played with her Nintendo (we remembered to charge it this time), I slept a bit.. and we stopped for lunch at McDonalds where Josie played in the playground. It was fun.

We got to Canberra in the afternoon, checked into the hotel (Formula 1!) and went immediately to check out Floriade.

It was just beautiful. I am not too much into flowers per se.. I was excited about taking some nice photos of Josie with flowers, and I wasn't disappointed. The photo ops there were lovely. I even managed to snare some nice macro shots of tulips and the like. Flickr has been updated with all the photos. Check it out.

We spent a few hours there, until we were all knackered, and then went to dinner with some friends of Uncle Mat's. Peter, Jennifer and their kids took us to this fabulous chinese place that had amazing food!

After that we retired back to the snazzy Formula 1 hotel where Josie had a room with Granny and Tony and I had a room to ourselves and of course Mat & Wendy. If you have never stayed at a Formula 1, its quite an experience. Its very cheap, but the room was clean and neat. The reason its so cheap is cause amenities are quite scarce. And the rooms are quite small. But if you are not planning on spending a lot of time in a hotel room, this is the place to be. The room had a queen bed with a bunk above it, and a sink and TV in the corner. Also in the room was a bathroom, but all it had in it was a shower and a toilet. There was no sink (that was out in the main room). The bathroom was made out of fiberglass (??) and basically reminded me of an airplane toilet.

Anyway, we spent the night quite comfortably, and then the next morning we checked out, and headed off to Pancake Palace (?) for breakfast where we all gorged ourselves on pancakes. After that we stopped briefly in the Koko Black chocolate shop where we bought some choccies and then headed off to Questacon.

We took Josie to Questacon a few years ago, but to be honest, she was just too young to really get her feet wet so to speak.

This time was very different.

We spent many hours at Questacon and Josie just loved it. If we had something like that in Sydney, I would have a yearly pass to it.

There was just SO much for her to do. Things to push, things to pull, things to poke and prod. There was an entire section devoted to younger kids where there was a water area with water equipment that carried water along pipes and turnstiles. Josie got drenched, but she had an absolute ball there. And at every step there was something else she could get her hands on. It was a 5 year old's dream!

Eventually, exhausted, we dragged her out, and headed off home. We got home around 9pm or so, Josie was already asleep and absolutely knackered.

And the next morning Term 4 started.

Term 4!

The final term at preschool. She starts Kindy next year. Big school! *CRY* I am more stressed out about this than she is obviously.

So that covers Canberra.

Last weekend was pretty eventful. I had Friday off and on Friday night, Josie slept at Vika's place and Tony and I went out to dinner at a russian restaurant. It was great! Live music, great food and lots of it! It was like going to mums for dinner.. except we had to pay for it ;-)

On Saturday, Tony picked up Josie from Vika's and took her to dance class and afterwards we all went to Coogee for lunch. After Coogee we dropped Josie off with Granny and Vika, Becka, Becka's friend Daniella, Tony and I went to see Harry Potter & the Order of the Pheonix at iMax. Absolutely fabulous! Especially the 3D bit at the end. It was a great night.

Sunday was a long day with two birthday parties (one in the morning for a 1 yr old and 1 in the afternoon for two 5yr olds), where I got branded with a few temp tattoos (which I still have). After the parties I was absolutely done so I decided it was time we went for a swim, so we met Vika and Becka in the afternoon for a quick swim at the local pool before they closed. It was quite refreshing.

And thats that! Go check out the photos in Flickr and have a look at the Floriade set.

Josie Speak

From Becka:

I was looking on the Luna Park website and she saw the big face thingo and goes:
Josie: I've been there before
Bec: No Jose, you're too little, you havn't, you're too little
Josie: How can I be little? I'm 4 years old! You are only little when you are 1, 2 and 3 and I'm not 1, 2, or 3, I'm 4, so I'm not little ok? I'm 4 years old!

And this morning driving to school listening to the radio:

Josie: I think this is about God
Mari: What is?
Josie: This radio show
Mari: Maybe.. who is God honey?
Josie: Uhm.. God is.. the man's brother.. at first, he wouldn't let his people go, and then he killed everyone.
Mari: Uhhh honey.. I think you mean Pharoah?
Josie: [Throwing hands up in the air] Ugh! I don't think I know God..

Well you can't know everyone..

And yesterday walking to the car Josie tells me:

Josie: I had a dream last night.. that Uncle Mat was in your bed! With Daddy. And you. And me!
Mari: Oh really? What was Uncle Mat doing there?
Josie: He was sleeping. And kicking me!

..I must have a talk to Uncle Mat.. the next time he sleeps over.. no kicking Josie in his sleep.. or us for that matter..

I know, I know.. Canberra update coming soon..

In which Josie "handles" Daddy

The other night I was putting Josie to bed and when I asked her if she wanted Potter or Belgarion (the two "big" books I am currently reading to her - she alternates as neither has managed to capture her attention like The Hobbit did) we had this little exchange:

Daddy: Which story do you want Potter or Belgarion?
Josie: Show me! *she looks over the edge of her bed eagerly*
Daddy: *pulling out the container with her current rotation of books on top of it and lifting out the aforementioned books*
Josie: Get the Green Book. (The "Green Book" is the leatherbound edition of The Hobbit I had already read to her)
Daddy: *making a face* No green book sweety. Potter or Belgarion.
Josie: Nooo I'm gonna choose!
Daddy: *thinking he's smart, asks slyly* Which one are you going to choose?
Josie: *being actually smart* Let's find out! GO get the Green Book!"

Having been undeniably "pwn3d" by my 4 year old I hung my head (actually I laughed so hard a little pee came out) and went and got the Green Book as ordered.

And I thought we'd be dealing with the kid's nightmares about now...

So I'm sitting up in bed the other night doing my brain training (a NintendoDS game), and Mari is already asleep somewhere beside and to my back when she starts whimpering, tossing and finally thrashing about and crying out.

Now, normally I give her a few soothing pats on the arm and shush her back to a more peaceful sleep but tonight I'm busy with my training so it escalates, culminating with her jerking awake panting and with much palpitation:

"Whoa, Tony, you've gotta wake me when I have a nightmare like that!" she admonishes me groggily.
Wondering how I got designated the Hasslehoff of the bedroom and where I should stick the flags I enquire, "What were you dreaming?"
Dreamily, already drifting back into sleep she confides, "The playdoh was chasing me!"
"You what?", and of course I'm picturing formless blobs of playdoh but nope nothing is quite so simple with my dearheart.
"A playdoh dinosaur! It gripped my arm in it's mouth! And it hurt!", she shudders as she relives her ordeal.
"How big was it?" I ask, presciently guessing what the answer must be knowing my wife as I do.
"Hmf?" Not even the horror of the playdoh dinosaur can long stand betwixt my love and her sleep.
"How big was it?" I say again, speaking in the distinct tones one adopts when unsure if the listener has reverted to understanding only russian as she so often does when only half awake.
"Mmmm BIG! Like THIS big" She replies, raising her arm about a foot off the bed.
"Mmmm huge" says I in the best approximation of seriousness I can muster under the circumstances.

And with that I give her arm a belated pat and send her off back to sleep and hopefully no further run-ins with The Dreaded Midget Playdoh Dinosaur of Hill Manor.

Grown Ups Night Out & The Weekend

Last Friday night Josie slept at Baba's so that Mummy and Daddy could go on a date.

It was fabulous!

We went out for dinner at a place at Fox Studios. It was delicious! The only thing that marred the night was the bloody thousand bogong moths flying around. Honestly, do we have to have a yearly plague?

After dinner we made a quick trip to Jacqui's place so Tony can fiddle with her laptop. They have a medium sized aquarium and some tropical fish. One of which has had a number of pregnancies (even though her mate died a few months ago!!) Currently they have a million baby fish inside the tank, another million in one breeder box and the mother, currently pregnant again, in a second breeder box. I tell you, baby fish are SOOO cute!

We got home around midnight and didn't get to sleep till around 3am, which was quite silly because we had organised a conference call with Harri for Saturday morning. I sent her an email saying we were pooped and can we do it Sunday morning instead.

On Saturday morning, once I had woken up, I went and picked up Josie from mums, and we went shopping.

Shopping is always an interesting experience with Josie. If its not "I want this!" "I want that!", its always Josie trying to steer a full trolley of groceries all by herself. The afternoon was uneventful though, so thats a blessing.

Sunday morning was very exciting though. We had our Skype call with Harri, Sven and Ella.

It was so exciting to see them all, especially Ella, who was a trooper lying in mums arms the whole time. We were lucky in our timing cause Ines & Dave had come round to drop off some stuff at just the right time, so we all got to chat with Harri.

Josie was very excited to see Harri and Ella and 'Auntie Sven'.

After the call, and after Ines & David left, we got ready and went to meet Mat, Wendy and Granny at Coogee for lunch.

Coogee is always a favourite place for a meal cause we sit outside and bask in the lovely Sydney weather.
After lunch, Mat, Wendy, Tony, Josie and I all went Bowling. It was so much fun (Josie's second time). Mat won, Josie beat both me AND Tony, Wendy came second and I came last ;-)

Let me tell you though, bowling has changed some since the last time I went!

Firstly, the shoes are VELCRO! Can you imagine? VELCRO! Last bowling shoes I put on were lace ups!
Secondly, there were no computers! All the names were programmed in at the front desk, and the scoring happened automatically!
And thirdly, the kids gutter guards came up AUTOMATICALLY every time it was her turn!

I was muchos impressed!!

So thats pretty much it for last weekend. I am now back from Canberra the weekend after and need to update about that!! Bah!!

The Cook And The Niece

Josie has become somewhat interested in cooking shows on TV, since watching an episode or two of Kylie Kwong's new DVD at my place. Where normally you'd need to use a nailgun to convince her to stay still for two seconds when she's visiting at Uncle Mat's, after a few seconds of the show starting she was transfixed. Antony is hopeful that this will progress to her keeping him well-fed until she moves out of home.

She is now willing to watch anything to do with cooking, and on her most recent visit to my domicile settled down to watch some Jamie Oliver while sitting in her Uncle Mat easy chair. Having grown a little pudgier in my old age, I apparently make a good beanbag.

But I was assured that aliens had not in fact stolen her brain and swapped it with another - she grew impatient with Jamie riding around on his mo-ped buying ingredients and insisted that he get on with the cooking. I tried to make her understand that before you could cook food you had to go out and buy ingredients but I don't know if I convinced her. She's very adept at giving you this look that says "Ok I'm sure you believe that. You're obviously either insane, stupid, or both, and have little or no idea as to how the universe really works."

I mean everybody knows food comes out of the magic fridge right? ; )

A Letter For The Ages..

Every now and then, dad pens a letter that is just gold.. no edits from me.. see below..

To Body Corporate

I bring you my attenition to dengerous situation on trafic on our body corporate garage.

As you now all car stay nose in to the wall and we are moving from parking spot backwoods.

But next to my parking spot on left hand side (entrance to building) is full wall and this wall close view fir trafic cars from top off the garage. The cars moving by left side (as Australian rules) it is make very dengerous situation for car moving from parking spot backwoods, because wall next to my spot obstruct view and I cannot see any car (or even people moving from top of garages - which is happends very often).

Last week accident nearly happend when car moving from top of garages to main gate and I was moving from my parking spot. If accident happend on such situation all recponsibility of accident to be on body corporate insurance.

To avoid such situation I suggest to install mirror on this area like we have mirror on other spot inside of garage.

Please have install this mirror as soon as possible.

And after this piece quality writing.. no he didn't get his mirror..

Oh My Goodness, The Chips!

Implementing a Token Economy

A token economy is a psychological tool that is used to encourage desirable behaviours in children. Children earn “tokens” or points for exhibiting a range of desirable behaviours and can then redeem them for goods from a store at a pre-determined time.

A few weeks ago we started implementing a Token Economy at home. Josie had been getting progressively more and more difficult to manage since she turned 4 so we decided to try it. We had actually heard of this method from The Mommycast, a couple of years ago, but it was too early to implement then. Now however, is a different story. We bought a case of real poker chips, they are the good quality heavy ones that feel like you are holding something substantial, not the fake plastic ones, and away we went.

And what a change. I hardly recognise my daughter. She has taken to this like a toddler to Toys R Us!

Whenever we see that Josie has done something we have asked her to straight away; has obviously listened to what we have said; is told not to do something and actually stops her actions to talk about it with us; is being attentive, helpful, pleasant, etc she gets a poker chip.

The poker chips come in 4 colours, red, blue, green and black, with the red being worth the least, and the black being worth the most.

Red is 10pts.

Blue is 20pts.

Green is 50pts.

Black is 100pts.

1 point = 10c.

Usually she will get a red, however when we see that she has done something extra good or say if she has had to behave through a number of activities in a row (eg getting up, dressed, hair and teeth brushed of a morning without throwing any tantrums or refusing to co-operate) she will get a blue. After just 3 or 4 weeks she has even started to earn greens! Which she does by being a good girl for an entire afternoon/evening. The blacks she can only get by trading in groups of the lesser ones. Although we have told her if she is good for an entire weekend she will get a black one. But that is more as an encouraging, "lofty goal" to give her an emotional boost rather than a real expectation on our part. No 4 year old should be expected to be perfectly behaved every minute for days. As luck would have it the black ones are her favourites. So that gives her an extra incentive and a longer term goal to accrue the smaller ones so she can trade them in.

She's collected quite a few of the chips now and her behaviour has changed dramatically. She still gets into a mood occasionally, but it is now the exception, not the rule. Its amazing.

Last week we went and made our first purchase with her chips. An elephant game where the elephant blows butterflies out of his trunk and she has to catch them with her net. She loves it. And she knows that it was her good behaviour that bought her the game.

Also, a couple of months ago we were at Tony's uncles place and Josie found cousin Jacqui's Nintendo DS and wanted to play with it. To all our astonishment she was immediately able to play the thing! Well, we had a trip to Dubbo coming up and this was obviously the PERFECT thing for the long drive. So we borrowed Jac's and it worked a treat! Coincidentally we started the token economy shortly before the trip so we decided to offer her a second hand DS Lite from ebay "if she got 3 blue chips!". Remember this was early on so we couldn't foresee how quickly she would accrue 3 blue chips. Given what we have learned we would probably have set her the goal of 3 green or even 3 black ones! Anyway she got it last night, and as it happens it depleted her of the majority of her chips as we fiendishly devised a way to make up for the blunder with the initial cost of the thing; she had to pay extra for each of the games she got with it (it came with 14 GBA games). She was not too thrilled that she was left with only a few chips (of course being a 4 year old she is as fond of the poker chips as she is of a high-tech game system!), but we just reminded her what a good girl she was and told her we were sure she would have piles of chips again in no time and she was ecstatic!

Its brilliant. Its fantastic. I highly recommend it to all parents.

We have tried many disciplinary methods (has anyone else noticed how many punishment-based ones there are compared to so few reward based systems? Change comes slowly I guess.) over the years and never got a tenth of the results we are getting now.

Birthday Weekend Update

It was a loooong celebration ;-)

You don't turn 29-again every year! err.. well.. some of us actually DO ;-)

So for my 5th 29th birthday we had dinner at mums, dinner at Mat's, then dinner at Mat's again and then lunch at Trudy's! All the while, my tonsils were swollen and not getting any better!

Starting with the night of my birthday, Thursday, we went over to my mums for dinner. Dinner was lovely as usual and Josie had a great time playing with Becka.

On the Friday night, Mat offered to make dinner for us for my birthday. This was such a lovely gesture and I was very touched. Then I laid down some ground rules.

1. No Roasts.
2. No stupid movies
3. No Snatch (a movie Mat has been trying to get me to watch for years!)
4. No British Movies
5. No Victor Borg

I had to lay down rules or I would have ended up watching some comedian from Scotland who I couldn't understand! And The-Rules(tm) I relayed via Tony.

So then we had the following conversation on Meebo:

Mat: so Miss Fussypants No-Roast .. what DO you want for your birthday dinner?
Mari: lol
Mari: did you get my list of demands?
Mari: No Snatch
Mari: No Victor Borg
Mari: No English crap
Mari: No Stupid DVDs
Mat: nothing good in other words
Mari: ;-)
Mat: how bout we all sit around and read The Belgariad?
Mari: YES!!!
Mari: HOW wonderful!
[The Belgariad and The Mallorean are my all time favourite books by David Eddings]
Mari: as for dinner.. uhm.. the only exception to the No-Roast rule is chicken ;-)
Mari: We like roast chicken ;-)
Mari: and a no-weed salad policy exists ;-)
Mat: you'll get baked beans on toast at this rate Missy
Mari: lol
Mari: well like i said.. chicken's ok ;-)
Mari: how about steak & kidney pie ?
Mari: ;-)
Mari: or you know.. any seafood is likely to make my night ;-)
Mari: any seafood and I may even move in ;-)
Mari: and messy seafood.. the kind of seafood you can get up to your elbows in
Mari: lol
Mari: seriously though, anything is fine ;-)
Mari: I was only joking ;-)
Mari: but if theres no seafood then Ill pout.
Mat: lol
Mat: your husband works VERY close to the fish markets
Mari: hehehe
Mat: of course this is of little use as he will not transport any seafood to my place within anything approaching a reasonable timeframe
Mari: I could get him to buy stuff.. he would HAVE to cause its for my birthday
Mari: Ill make him
Mat: how about .. you get him to buy the stuff at lunchtime or in the morning
Mat: and you will probably have to make it VERY clear to him that this really needs to be done, or else his 'nads are forfeit
Mari: yup!
Mat: and I will go by his work on the way home and collect it
Mari: ok done deal
Mat: if you can convince him that buying seafood would be a better option for his health than playing basketball
Mari: he can bite me.. im more important than his bloody basketball
Mari: lol
Mari: oookay
Mat: so .. what seafood to get ...
Mat: prawns
Mat: can make some of that really nice sauce that Wendy and I learned at the seafood school for BBQ prawns
Mat: you can either marinade the prawns in it and bbq them or you can just dip em in it
Mari: hmmmmm.. prawns!!!
Mat: scallops?
Mari: and crabs
Mat: I have a very nice scallop recipe
Mari: yeh.. scallops will come up to my finger nails
Mari: elbows!
Mari: ok.. so what about lots of crabs.. in a pot.. with some spices?
Mari: ;-)
Mat: hmmm ... got a seafood spice blend from Herbies that should be good
Mat: I'll make a shopping list for Ant
Mari: hehehe cool ;-)

So then I relayed the mission onto the field agent..

Mari: Here is your mission
Mari: You have no choice but to accept it
Tony: I symbolically accept the mission
Mari: on Friday during your lunch hour
Mari: we (me and Mat.. mostly me..) need you to go to the fish markets..
Mari: Mat will provide a list
Mari: You must fulfil the list, and store it in your fridge at work
Mari: Mat will come by after work and pick it up
Tony: ok
Mari: You must state categorically that you accept your mission
Tony: I categorically accept my mission

And the deal was done.

Mat: what about fish .. I suppose Antony will whine if there is no barramundi on the menu
Mari: yah
Mari: lets just provide something symbolic for him
Mat: a picture of a fish?
Mat: a photo of a fish!
Mari: LOL

So on Friday my wonderful, dutiful, loyal, loving husband went to the Sydney Fish Markets and got:

• 2Kg Prawns
• 1Kg Scallops
• 3 Mud Crabs
• 2 Lobsters
• 1 Barramundi fillet
• 4 John Dory fillets
• 1 dozen oysters

(are you starting to see WHY we had dinner at Mat's two nights in a row ??)

Unfortunately, my wonderful, dutiful, loyal, loving husband didn't actually pay much attention to how long his list was and decided against taking the car to the fish markets. He walked. And then walked back. Carrying two huge boxes of seafood. Poor thing.

And then I get this msg from Mat:

Mat: ROFLMAO
Mat: Ant is having fun with the crabs
Mat: Tony: these crabs are alive!!!!!
Tony: you didnt warn me about live produce!!!!
Tony: and the biggest one has slipped his bonds!!!!
Mat: ROFL
Mari: ROFL

We laughed.

And then I get this:

Tony: the beast refuses to die!!!!!
Tony: over an hour in the freezer and he immediately tried to escape from the box as soon as I took it out to check on them!
Mari: ROFL

All in the name of love! ;-)

So Friday nights dinner was exquisite! I cannot even put it into words!

However we did run out of time (and stomach space!) to cook it all, so hence dinner on Saturday night.

On Saturday morning I went and did grocery shopping while Tony took Josie to her dance class, and then I got Josie, and Vika and Becka picked us up and we went to my cousin Anna's for lunch. This was fun and Jayden and Josie played for ages really well. Josie always loves playing with Jayden.

After lunch, Vika dropped us off home and we got Tony and went off to Mat's place for dinner where we were joined by a very lucky Karsoe who scored a magnificent seafood dinner ;-)

Then Sunday started off with a party for a school friend of Josie's (Jessie). Josie had a great time playing with her friends, and watching the show (The Funky Bugs).

After the party we grabbed Josie's best friend Rachel and headed straight to Grandma Trudy's place for lunch. The girls played beautifully inside and out in the backyard the whole day. Lunch was fantastic and we had a great time.

By the end of my 4 day birthday celebrations, I was pretty much over my tonsils. On Monday I went to the doctor with the intention of having them out but my doctor convinced me to give the antibiotics a last go. By Tuesday afternoon I was feeling much better and now I am fine, just have to finish the course of antibiotics, then take another month at a reduced intake, and then cross my fingers that its over.

I have always had large tonsils. Since I was a kid everyone was always impressed with my tonsils. They are big and round and surround my uvula. When they swell they are so big that they actually partially block my airways so that when I lie down, I dont get enough oxygen and wake up every 20 minutes or so gasping for air. Thus I hadn't had a good nights sleep in about two weeks! Its nice to be able to breathe again!

This has been a long one.. I am ready for bed ;-)

Happy Birthday Mari!!!!

I would like to wish a very happy birthday to the first love of my life (and mother of the second)!

To my wife, my heart and my soul, thank you for sticking with me for another year.
As most who read this site will know I am basically a disorganised, clown of a man most of the time and I thank God every day for her continued presence in my life.

In the latest of Mari's 29th years she has started a new job (the first in her professional career where she actually enjoys the role - and that's a long time for someone to wait to be happy in an endeavour that takes up such a big chunk of all of our lives) and has quickly shown her quality and come to be relied upon and looked to as a leader by her colleagues and boss. In the same time period we moved house in a long, drawn out and complicated procedure involving a layover of several months at Mari's parents and through all this Mari has continued to raise our daughter while also taking care of the vast bulk of organisational requirements that come along with a young pre-school-age child. She has done all this with little effectual help from the previously mentioned circus performer (except for the raising of the rug rat - I think I do alright in that area but lets face it, I find my hands full with just that one shared task).

Thank you baby.

LOVE

DUBBBBBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

.. otherwise known as DUMBO!

So our long weekend began on Friday morning when we all got up to pack (!) and get going to Dubbo.

We were all very excited.. and true to form, even though it was a 2 night trip, we had 2 big bags, Josie's suitcase, two fridge bags and a bathroom bag! Comparatively it was a lot better than our US trip.. but still..

So away we went.. at about 1130am (I had desperately wanted to leave by 10am but it was not to be). Our first stop was Uncle David's house where we swiped his GPS. That GPS turned out to be a godsend! More on that later!

After having secured the GPS, I was horrified to realise that the Nintendo DS that I had borrowed from Jacqui for Josie to play on the way was almost out of battery and while I had a charger for it, it wasn't a car charger! Josie was told quite firmly that she had to ration her DS use and I was SO surprised at how well she did that. Every time I reminded her that she should take a break from it, she handed it over without a problem. On a couple of occasions she actually handed it over without a reminder from me. I was very impressed, considering how little impulse control our daughter has! ;-) The DS lasted to about the Blue Mountains. After that Josie was quite content to look at books and draw. In fact she was just an angel on the way there. I don't remember her complaining at all (although I may have just blocked it out ;-). We stopped a couple of times at Hungry Jacks, to have lunch and for a toilet break, where she could play in their playground. I think this broke up the journey somewhat for her. She was just magnificent on the way there.

The journey there took about 9 hours. 9 hours! This was mostly due to the long weekend traffic. The huge long weekend traffic! Having said that the GPS was wonderful. We were able to bypass chunks of the traffic by finding parallel roads and just taking them. She (the GPS) would freak out when we would do this. She was quite happy when we stuck to her instructions, but when we strayed, she became quite irritable, however, once we did take other roads, she was very helpful in finding our way back to the highway!

We got to Dubbo at about 830pm. Josie was already asleep by then, so we basically put her in her room, shut the door, and melted into the tub. I had specifically booked an apartment that had a spa. It wasn't a round type spa, it was long, but it did have bubbles. We couldn't turn on the bubbles cause it was too loud, but the bath was larger than a standard bath, so we both managed to relax in there for a while.

On Saturday morning I woke up with a bit of a sore throat. I figured it was probably from the dry, dusty outback air.

We got ready and headed out to the Western Plains Zoo. When we got there, the queue of cars waiting to get in was down the road. We got the the end of the line, and 45 mins later we finally drove through the huge zoo gates.

The Western Plains Zoo is just beautiful. Its huge, with animals everywhere and I don't know how people do it all on foot. We took our car around. We managed to see lots of animals and Josie loved it all. I will post some photos on Flickr soon.

Unfortunately, after about 4 hours there my throat started to hurt a lot more, and by the time we got back to the hotel, my tonsils had swollen so much that lying down I could not breathe. I lay down for much of that evening, and when it came time to go to bed, Tony had to prop me upright with about 4 pillows so that I could sleep and breathe at the same time. It was the most uncomfortable night of my life. I woke up every 15-20 minutes and the time just crawled. By about 6am the swelling was down a bit and I was able to lean back, so Tony went into Josie's room (she had woken up), got in bed with her and they fell back asleep. I figure I must have kept him up half the night. Once he left, I removed all the pillows, left mine, lay back, and slept till about 8am. It was bliss. My back was aching though.

That morning (Sunday) we packed up and headed off back to Sydney. The GPS once again was great in helping us avoid the Back-To-Sydney traffic, but the trip, even though it was only 7hrs this time, was difficult. Josie was quite restless and sick of the whole thing. In the last 2 hours she basically kept repeating "I wanna go home!! I wanna go home!!" over and over again, to the point that Tony and I were just ready to leave her on the side of the road and make her walk!! ;-)

We finally made it home at about 530pm. We were all exhausted!

I went to work Monday but left a bit early to go see the Dr.. took Tuesday off to recuperate and am now back at work with very little of my sore throat left and my tonsils back to normal. Yay!

It was a nice trip.. but I think next time, anything over a 5 hr drive, and we'll just fly ;-)

Slow News Day in Sydney.. ?

Read it here. Give me a break! ...

Meat and greet all the president's lunch

September 5, 2007 - 3:00PM

He may have a lot on his plate during this week's APEC negotiations, and critics have argued he bit off more than he could chew in the Iraq war, but a Sydney nutrionist is now chastening US President George Bush over his choice of food during an official lunch today.

The main concern with the plate is the quantity of the protein-rich foods, with a very small amount of vegetables and no breads at all

Mr Bush - a self-confessed "meat guy" - was snapped holding a plate with a large steak, two sausages, at least four prawns, a sliver of carrot and small piece of corn.

Not Poxy!

.. but here's some spinning.. sideways...

Does This Look Chicken-Poxy?

?!


Please tell me I'm just spotty?!

Conversations With Young People

[21:45] Meebo Message: Jac is offline
[21:46] Meebo Message: Jac is online
[21:46] Tony: what happened?
[21:47] Tony: you went offline,,,,,
[21:47] Jac: yeah ichat isnt working so i tried restarting the internet
[21:48] Tony: THAT'S why our connection has been going in and out for the past few days!!! YOU'v been restarting the internet!!!
[21:49] Jac: har har
[21:49] Jac: :\
[21:53] Jac: i meant my internet
[21:55] Tony: you have your own INTERNET?!!?
[21:55] Jac: u r very annoying...
[21:55] Tony: Where did you get it?!?
[21:55] Jac: and yes, yes i do
[21:55] Jac: i get it from the magical fountain at the end of my bed
[21:55] Tony: _I_ want an internet!!!!!

Playing with Photoshop

I am about to go to bed.. but I wanted to post a photo I got at the beach today. Ive been playing with Photoshop the last couple of hours.. this photo just makes me cry..

School Photos!

We got Josie's school photos last week. These are the final ones from her preschool. Next year she starts wearing a uniform.

Here is one.. and the rest you can see here..

Weekend Happenings

We had another jam packed weekend.

On Friday we went over to Mat's place for dinner and a movie, managed to have a lovely dinner and watch some of Planet Earth before I couldn't take it anymore and fell asleep. I did NOT snore!

Saturday was going to be a pretty good day. We were MEANT to go see Harry Potter at iMax. Again. The first time we tried, we all got sick so I had to cancel. This time we got there, saw a couple of ads, and waited for half an hour before they announced that they were having technical difficulties and the session was cancelled!! Can you believe it??

We had gone to Yum Cha before that, so that was nice. The day was not a whole a whole write off!

Josie spent the day with Granny, so after the whole iMax debacle we went to a normal cinema and saw License to Wed with Robin Williams. Good movie, not one of his best.

Sunday was lovely. Raining with gale force winds, but lovely.

We were going to go to the Aquarium with Ines, David & Josh, but the weather was just too scary to brave the city, so we went to Mamacinos instead. We stayed there from about 10am till about 3pm, having breakfast AND lunch! The kids played really well and had a great time together. Josie was not a happy chappy when we had to go.

I will post some photos soon, haven't updated Flickr in a while. Just have to get around to it.

New Relatives and a Very Busy Friday

On Thursday night we went to dinner at my mums where we met some second cousins from Russia. My mum's mum's sister's grandson and his wife. They were very nice, Grisha & Ira. Ira spoke and understood some english, Grisha not so much. They are planning on moving here in the next 12 months on Student Visas.

Today (Friday) was a very long day.

It started at about 7am when I hurried out of bed and got ready to be at the school by 8am for a talk on drugs, alcohol, smoking and cyber bullying.

It was extremely interesting with great presentations and insights from psychologists, police, researchers and youth support people. It raised some things that I couldnt even begin to imagine existed. Such as parents who let their year 8 kids leave the house on a Friday or Saturday night (any night really) with a bottle of vodka, so that they will only drink from that bottle all night, and not from a strange bottle that could be spiked.

Uhm, hello ?

14 year old kid? Shouldnt be drinking anyway?? What kind of world are we living in??

During the Q&A one girl (there were parents and students in the talk) asked about catching buses home after a party in groups, "because we can't expect our parents to come get us at 1230am"...

Uhm, hello? Why the hell not?!?! What kind of parent lets their kid leave the house on a Friday or Saturday night without having organised exactly how they are getting home, and certainly NOT on public transport!

What the hell??

Anyways, we came away from that talk a lot wiser, and I hope the kids there (from Year 8, 9 & 10) were listening very carefully.

After that I went to work for about 3 hours before having to leave again to pick up Becka and Josie and go to a Pain Study at the Childrens Hospital.

The study was very interesting too.

Since the age of about 2, Josie has had leg pain at night on and off. We always put it down to too much activity during the day.. but then I started thinking maybe it was rheumatism, because almost all the females on my mums side of the family, including myself, my sister and Becka, have always had this muscular rheumatoid type pain, since childhood. We have always said it was rheumatism, but we never actually got it diagnosed. It was usually fixed up by keeping the area warm and taking some Panadol or Neurofen.

Anyways, so we went in and the researcher did a bunch of tests on Josie to show how much she was feeling the touch. They think that the pain is caused by a high nerve sensitivity. She used different tools to touch Josie's legs, arms and tummy, and asked Josie to tell her whether she felt the touch more on one leg or the other etc. It as very interesting.

I spoke to the Dr in charge, and told him about the rheumatism that has always been in my family and he said that it probably was not rheumatism, but was actually Fibromygalia.

The 'Growing Pains' that Josie was experiencing would most likely develop into Fibromygalia as well. So now I am trying to find stuff about it ;-)

So after the study, we went to Anna's place, where Becka was babysitting Jayden for the night, and we stayed and played for a while before dropping Anna off at the station and heading home.

It was a fairly looongish day..

Should be an interesting weekend ;-)

Long Weekend and a New Baby!

My best friend Harri gave birth to her first child yesterday. She and her husband Sven named her Ella. What a gorgeous name, and we are so so happy and excited for them.

Still waiting for photos and measurements though! Ahem! Its not like she's... busy.. or anything.. ;-)

Can't wait to see ;-)

This past weekend has been pretty full on.

Of course we had Dance class and swim class. Tony as usual took her to her classes and I went and did the grocery shopping.

But to pack even more in we went to Mamacinos with Roman, Helen and Stacey for brunch (it was great fun and the girls loved playing in the play area) and ontop of that off we went to a birthday party for some girls in Josie's class. That was good fun too as they had a big trampoline set up with the side nets so the kids had a ball in there.

To top it all off on Sunday night we went to Mat's for dinner with Wendy's family. Wendy's family is so lovely and we always have a great time with them. Josie had a great time, as always, at Uncle Mat's place.

During my weekly shopping I came across something that I had only seen once before at the school. Its called Floy and its like playdough but slightly different. Its little white balls in this gluey, slimy mixture, and you mold it like playdough, but when it dries, it feels like polystyrene. Its fabulous! I got a kit of 5 colours for Josie and we had a great time playing with it.

I had an appointment with the dentist today. I havent been since Xmas 2004 so I was long overdue and my teeth aren't the best anyway. It took him an hour to clean only the top left quadrant. I have to make some more appointments to finish off the whole mouth. My health insurance is not going to cover them all. I don't know how we are gonna pull this one off.

This week is fairly hectic at work. We are one down, actually we are two down with one coworker on paternity leave for two weeks (everyone is having babies!!).

Anyways, theres my update. Ive been kinda slack lately but Im hoping more interesting stuff will happen ;-)

Four Under FOUR!

Huge congrats to my cousin and his wife.

They have just had their 4th, yes FOURTH daughter.

Thats four (4) girls, under 4 (FOUR) years old.

FOUR.

Under FOUR.

Girls.

My eye is twitching..

Twitching.. but decidedly jealous ;-)

My Child is a Genius

Tony has set up a profile on my iMac for Josie and showed her how to log in.

She now knows to:

Click on my name in the top right hand corner, then select her name in the drop down menu.
Then it comes up with a window asking for a password and she knows how to enter her password (josie).
Then she has her little dock of games and applications at the bottom and she knows how to click on them to load the programs and away she goes.

Four and a half years old.

Genius I tell ya.

Four and a Half, Going on 40

In the car this morning..

Josie: I can be lots of things. I can be a girl fireman, and a fairy, and a butterfly and a pony..
Mari: Yes honey, you can be anything you want to be..
[A few minutes to ponder]
Josie: Mummy, I just can't help the silly moments..

;-)

On.. In.. Doesn't Matter!

Ok I haven't been posting any conversations with my dad cause my mum told me off for embarrassing him in front of the entire world (cause thats who reads my blog, didn't you know??). So I stopped. But this I couldn't resist.

He had been given a second hand laptop at work and wanted us to have a look at it.

Mari: well bring it tonight and we will have a look over the weekend
George: so don't be late today
Mari: I will be there before you
Mari: and if not you can just leave it
George: ok see you
George: it is on my car
George: so it is mine already
Mari: well take it off your car before you leave because it will fall off when you move the car
George: no it is on the car box
Mari: your car has a box ?
George: yes on the boot
Mari: well you need to take it off the boot because when you move the car the box will slide off the boot.
George: it is inside of box
George: and box is fixed to the car
Mari: on the boot ?
Mari: you fixed a box to the top of your boot?
Mari: how do you open the boot ?
George: it is inside of my boot
Mari: ahhh right
Mari: so IN your car.. not ON your car then ?
George: at least
George: for my it is the same
Mari: its at least in your car?
George: on.....in.....
Mari: and at most under it ?
George: you want competision in russian
Mari: no thanks.. I dont live there
George: i will laught too
George: you was born....
George: and you first languch was russian
George: so you probably just forgot russian
Mari: probably

My mum will probably have strong words for me.. but after three days of taking care of a house full of sick people, it was a good laugh ;-)

Harika & Sven's Baby Guessing Game

I have set up a Guessing Pool for Harri & Sven!

Please have a guess!

A Sick Household

Bah.. this is fun.. NOT..

Josie has the flu.. Tony has the flu.. Granny has the flu.. everyone has the bloody flu!!!!!

Josie has had temps up to 39.5. Tony hasn't had temps but he has thrown up all over the floor.

Gloria is sick in bed with temps AND throwing up.

I'm fine ;-) I had a flu shot. I'm ALL good.. so far.. lol..

I managed to be at work for a whole hour before having to come home and take care of both sick people.

Tomorrow Josie will be going to Baba's, Tony will be home and I, hopefully, will be going to work.

Mini Update

I know I haven't blogged for a while..

Just been very slack is all ;-)

I have updated Flickr with a LOT of new photos.. http://www.flickr.com/photos/josiephotos/.. check them out ;-)

Everything is fine with everyone.. although Josie is kinda sick at the moment with a cold..

Its 1130pm and I need to get to bed now.. enjoy the photos..

Fall of The Great Thinker

See.. even the intellectual have their moments..

Mat: tried to get some cool photos of the moon two nights ago
Mat: was very full and yellow over the water
Mat: couldn't stop the camera shake .. even on a tripod
Mat: just pressing the button moved the camera
Tony: set the timer
Mat: bought a remote shutter release on Ebay for $6
Mat: ok you know what .. you go to hell
Mat: you go to hell and you die
Tony: ROFL

And More From Josie..

She was just full of conversation today..
_____________

From Becka..

We are all watching The Bold and The Beautiful and Josie starts talking:

Josie [in a nagging voice]: Becka... Becka...

Becka: Shhhh Jose we are watching..

Josie runs into the other room and returns a few minutes later.

Josie: Becka you were silly. I thought about it. I went and sat in the naughty spot and I thought about it, you were just being silly, ok?
_____________

Then on the way home.. out of no where..

Josie: Mummy, Bambi was little.. and then he growed big..
Mari: Yes honey, Bambi was a dear..
Josie: But I am already a dear!

and later still in the car..

Josie: Mummy, do I have any bruddas?
Mari: No honey..
Josie: Do I have any stisters?
Mari: No honey.. you have cousins..
Josie: Yeh like Matty.. he's my little baby boy.. he sits on my lap and he's so heavy that I can't even pick him up, he's a big baby but I am bigger.. I am this big [shows me how big she is.. which is about the size of a cat]..
Mari: Yes ok honey..
[A little time passes..]
Josie: What were we talking about??

LOL..

Lions and Elephants and Josie.. Oh My!

Josie is at Baba's today with Becka..

They were watching Play School on TV and they were showing elephants..

Becka: Have you ever seen real elephants?

Josie: No because they will eat me!

Becka: No, they live in cages.

Josie: Well i don't want to go to the zoo.

Becka: But they can't eat you because they will be in cages!!

Josie: Yeh but what about the Lions?

Becka: No everyone lives in cages so you just go and watch them.

Josie: Well I just don't like lions.

Becka: Well what about if on a nice day we go to the zoo and see everything except the lions?

Josie: Yeh... But no lions.

[Pondering...]

Josie: I have an idea, what about if we dress up like elephants and go to the zoo like that? I'm going to ask my mum to buy me an elephant suit because I want to be an Elephant!

LOL.. I'm off to the shops..

A New Babysitter

For years now our niece Becka has been bugging us to let her babysit Josie. We have always been reluctant because we were not confident in Josie listening and following the orders of anyone else. We were worried that Becka wouldn't be able handle an out of control and willful Josephine.

Over the last couple of months we have noticed a new maturity in both Josie and in Becka. One shows more promise in listening and following orders, and the other shows more maturity in thought and deed. So we decided to give it a go.

So last night, Tony and I went to see Fantastic Four (which was fabulous!) and left Becka in charge of Josie at home.

All worked out very well. Becka made sure that Josie had dinner (finished all her veges too!) and had her in bed and asleep by 8pm. She did a great job and Tony and I were very impressed. Well done Becka!

Its nice to think we now have another option at babysitting, and this one Josie will enjoy the best.

So the night before last Becka came over in the evening (to wash my dishes cause I am a lazy woman who let her dishes pile up to a state where I couldn't bare to look at them and had to go to rent-a-niece to get them done) and Tony took her home after that. The next morning Josie wakes up, comes straight to me, wakes me up and says:

Josie: Mummy! Why is Becka not asleep on the couch!?

I had to explain to her that that was happening the following morning.

So the next morning Josie joined Becka on the couch.. see below..

Mari & Josie == Everything

I related a set of events that happened today that renewed my appreciation for my wife and child on the message board of a podcast I listen to regularly (The Deadpan podcast).
Not going to re-write it here, you guys can deal with second hand content. So without further ado:

"Hey guys,

Sorry i haven’t contributed to the community in quite a while Jack (and after you gave me such a high by mentioning me in a list of new community members and all) but I have been listening to the podcast (Deadpan is indeed the way) and lurking in the boards every now and then.

Anyway, I wanted to share an experience I had today that involved the deadpan in finale.

I had a dream/nightmare last night (ie it started off ok and then went bad):
My wife and daughter and our 3 cats moved into a new house in a great neighbourhood.
My wife left the house to go to work leaving me and the Spudlette (my daughters nickname which is short for her super hero name “Spudlette The Crazy Chicken”….erm….mine is “The Bowel”…don’t ask. My wifes is “The Glare”…anyhoo!) to start getting the house into some kind of order.

Well after a few bits which aren’t Germain to the nightmare part the time period sort of changed such that even though time had gone forward I no longer had ever had a daughter and my wife had left me. And I was still in the living room of the house (with just the cats now) having to start the unpacking.

Just as I finished the unpacking and was doing something at one of the windows I saw my wife's car pull up and she got out in a wedding dress. Somehow I knew she was coming back from her honeymoon. She and her new husband who was an old friend of mine. They were going to live in the new house. My mother was helping her out of the car (because of the dress being so cumbersome) and into the house.

They all entered the house and while my mother and my wifes new husband and (perhaps) his mother were all sorting stuff out my wife (Mari - ironically…you should have seen what a clown I looked like when I asked her father for his permission to “marry…er…Mari”) came into the lounge room and started to talk to me like nothing was wrong, like we must have had a perfectly amicable split. That wasn't how I felt. I felt destroyed.

I left the room, pushing past her and heading for the kitchen. She followed me and I realised I was going to try to win her back. With her standing in a wedding dress and having just returned from her honeymoon. Tough but I needed her. I couldn’t live without her. And I remembered my baby, like she was a future that had been changed because I had stuffed up and lost my wife.

Just as I was starting to talk to her the husband, my friend, walked into the kitchen and knowing our history he was suspicious and well to cut a short story shorter we started to fight.
A sword fight.
With hard cardboard tubing.
Awesome fight. Very kung fu.

In the middle of the fight I woke up in my bed. I looked over my shoulder and my wife was not there. And my heart just about exploded until I rolled further and bumped up against something. Turning over fully I found it to be my little girl snuggled up in the covers up against me. And my heart did burst. I drew her into my arms and held her against me for a long time. During which I heard sounds of Mari in the other room getting ready for work. Everything was ok.

The dream didn't really linger in my mind very long after I too got up and started (very hurriedly) getting ready to take my daughter to school and then myself to work (we were running very late now) but when I got into work I remembered the dream and started to related it to Mari over IM. By the time I was finished I was feeling very emotional again and sad. The feelings were still very fresh. Just as I finished recounting the tale I hit the end of Deadpan 59 (which I have listened to before but I like the Tee Morris interview enough to keep listening when my playlist clocked over back to the beginning) where you (Jack of course) played the song which I don't know the name of (To Make You Feel My Love seems possible) and I just about lost it completely. Being an emotion junky and a bit of a masochist I don't know if this was the worst time or the best time for that song to kick in but it had a pretty spectacular effect to say the least.

Mari suggested chocolate to cheer me up but I opted instead for the solitude of the bathroom for a little breakdown. I’m ok now though.

Thank you Jack, for playing that song as frequently as you do. Though it may have been painful it enhanced an experience I was having and made the lessons learned all the more powerful.

Deadpan for life.

Myrddin"

We Have Harry !

Woohoo!

Harry Potter Gold Class! First Saturday, 1pm! Back centre seats!

WOOHOO!

Weirded out by Josie

I often feel like I'm going slightly mad in the moments between when Josie suddenly starts talking out of nowhere and when I figure out what she's talking about.

This morning we were sitting in traffic on our way to school and I'm thinking about stuff going on at work when I hear, in the background of my thoughts, floating out of the back seat as if on the wind:

Josie: The chicken is holding the cats label...
Daddy: *distractedly* is he?
And then as my sub-conscious begins to start rapping smartly on my conscious for attention and the words "DOES NOT COMPUTE" start to light up in my head I become confused and swivel around in my seat in the hope that if I can see and therefore focus on the child she will start to make sense and the feeling of holding onto sanity by my fingernails will fade...
Daddy: Huh, hang on what? The cats hat?!
Josie: NOOOooo, its LABEL!
Daddy: Wha?!
But before I have time to ask some questions to try and make sense of this conversation she quickly hits back with...
Josie: *in her special thinking voice* I think it's a duck.
Daddy: *completely out to sea at this point* Wha? Duck? What?
Josie: It's not a biiiird! *VERY earnestly*
Daddy: *nothing. But in my head I'm screaming*
Josie: It's a chicken *her mind is made up by the tone in her voice*
Daddy: *I go to my special place...again...in my head* Dribble
Having decided what it is (whatever IT is) Josie now has enough bandwidth to notice Daddy is drooling into his beard and in exasperation points past my shoulder and says...
Josie: The bird!!! Hanging there!
I turn and see the bird and cat fluffy toys which harbor the deoderisers for my car and suddenly I feel myself washed ashore once more on the land on sanity.
Daddy: Oooooooh -thank christ for that-
I turn the bird around to get a look at it and proclaim...
Daddy: It's a toucan sweety
Having now had a good look at it and clearly disgusted by Daddy's paltry mental abilities Josie deadpan-stares me and matter-of-factly states...
Josie: It's a parrot.

Adendum
After we started moving again and a small pause in conversation I tried to reclaim some of my lost status with my daughter by suggesting...
Daddy: Is it a Pirate Parrot?!
To which Josie replied simply...
Josie: No.
In a tone which clearly stated "You are neither funny nor particularly bright. Now, I have intelligent conversations to pursue with my imaginary dollies ... shush."
I shut up for the rest of the trip.

First Ever Layout

I got the scrapbooking bug last night. Decided to try some digital scrapbooking. Here is my very first attempt! A bit simplistic but there you go ;-)

Who Is Family?

As we were pulling into Granny's driveway over the weekend we had the following conversation.

Josie: You are my family..
Mari: Yes honey, we are, good girl!
Josie: Me and Daddy and Mummy are all family.. and Granny and Baba..
Mari: Yep, and Grandpa and Dyeda and Uncle Mat and Auntie Wendy and Becka and Vika are all our family..
Josie: yeh and Auntie Harri..
[Dramatic pause while I wipe a tear..]
Mari: yes honey..
Josie: And Matty.. and Jayden..
Tony: Who is Jayden's mummy?
Josie [thinking]: Uhh I dunno..
Tony: Anna!
Josie [slaps forehead]: Yeh! Anna!

lol..